


the dreams i resist (won't be dismissed)

by Eluvia



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Demonic Possession, Gen, ToT: Monster Mash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-23
Updated: 2017-10-23
Packaged: 2019-01-21 17:09:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12462183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eluvia/pseuds/Eluvia
Summary: It's not the Raven Queen who chooses Vax.





	the dreams i resist (won't be dismissed)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [eliotkeats](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eliotkeats/gifts).



> A trick for eliotkeats! I hope you enjoy it.
> 
> Title from k.d. lang's 'Smoke Dreams.'

It's the Raven Queen he challenges, but the voice that answers him is low, angry, curls around his mind like smoke, filling every corner. _She can't help you,_ it says, _but I can._

"Yes," he whispers, barely more than a breath. He doesn’t know what this is. It doesn’t matter; there is no deal too costly, not when Vex'ahlia lies before him, pallid and still.

 _Everyone who hurt her will suffer,_ it promises. _She will live, and they will die._

 _Good_ , he thinks, and feels its pleasure at his acquiescence as if it were his own.

Before him -- before _them_ \-- Vex awakens, and Vax smiles.

* * *

They run into an acquaintance from Syngorn in Whitestone. He greets them as though they were old friends, full of smiles and jokes and well-wishes. Vax remembers, though, the names he’d called them as children, his barbed words, his "accidental" spell that caught Vex across the chest. She was in agony for days before the healer could undo the curse he'd used.

Vax smiles back, and wishes him a good journey. Later that night he slips back into the man’s room to draw his dagger across his throat. _Yes,_ the voice whispers, and Vax lets out a long breath. He feels _good_ , far better than he should, and unease creeps into him. He's just killed an unarmed man in his sleep for actions from over a decade ago.

 _Yes_ , it says again, content. "You did well."

Vax thinks of all the people who had wronged him and his sister in Syngorn, let alone in the rest of the world, and his unease grows. 

_Now you begin to understand_ , it says.

* * *

His dreams that night are full of smoke and shadows, and when he wakes in the morning he knows exactly what he's been hearing.

* * *

Vax goes down to breakfast the next morning in hopes of finding Pike, but she’s already left for Vasselheim. Percy is nowhere in sight, and he shakes off Vex’ahlia’s concern to go search for him.

He finds Percy in his workshop. "Freddy," he says, and Percy looks up, startled. His glasses have slipped down to the end of his nose, and his hair mussed every which way, and there is a streak of oil across his chin. Vax smiles at the sight, his heart lightening despite the burden he carries.

 _Are you so weak as to be fond of the man who killed your sister?_ the voice -- _Orthax_ asks, and Vax's smile drops. _We will make him pay, as the other paid. As the rest will pay._

"Not him," Vax says, and Percy blinks.

"Vax?" he asks. "Are you all right?"

"Not quite," he chokes out. _Careless, greedy, let Vex'ahlia die because he couldn't wait to get his hands on the treasure --_

He realizes belatedly that the words -- not _his_ words -- are coming out of his mouth as Percy gives him a long, narrowed look and sets his tinker’s tools down. His hand is creeping towards his holster, and the voice speaks again just as Vax notes the movement. _Not this time, I’m afraid,_ it says, the words spilling out of Vax's mouth again as a cloud of black smoke begins to rise around Vax.

"No," Percy breathes, and Vax shudders.

" _Yes_ ," he says -- they say, and Vax’s quick instincts have his dagger drawn and thrown before Percy's hand has even made it to Animus in its holster, and before he’s even realized he’s doing it. " _So nice to see you again, Percival. Did you miss me?_ "


End file.
